Abstract

Lake Verevi is a hypertrophic and strongly stratified (partly meromictic) small temperate lake. Vertical distribution of sediment phosphorus fractions as well as iron, manganese, organic matter and calcium carbonate of the deep bottom sediment was determined. The study focused on the ecologically important layer of the sediment [<20(45)cm]. In the uppermost layers of the sediment, NaOH-NRP (organic P) dominated while HCl-RP (apatite-P) became dominant in some deeper layers below 7 cm. Extremely high concentrations of labile phosphorus fraction (NH4Cl-RP) indicated the low binding capacity of phosphorus by lake sediment. Due to sediment and hypolimnion anoxia, the internal load of phosphorus in this lake is most likely. Potentially mobile phosphorus fractions (NH4Cl-RP, BD-RP, NaOH-NRP) formed 301 kg in upper 10 cm thick sediment layer of hypolimnetic bottom sediment (40% of lake bottom area).